The Wildlife Trust has begun work to create a new nature reserve at Preston Farm.

Immediately to the left of the Queen Elizabeth Way when crossing the Tees northbound from Ingleby Barwick, this land offers huge scope for wildlife.

Planning permission has been granted for the excavation of some shallow pools with an extensive reedbed.

A huge swathe of ground that slopes away from the floodplain is being planted with oak, ash and elm trees to form a new woodland.

The Wildlife Trust has long sought to assist the return of wildlife to the Tees by helping it return to a more natural condition.

The Trust’s nature reserve at Bowesfield, nearby, has already proved attractive to flocks of wildfowl and wading birds, the common darter and brown hawker dragonflies and the once elusive otter.

The work at Preston Farm is being supported by the Environment Agency as it makes an important contribution to regional and national biodiversity targets and also because the project will allow the land to function as a natural floodplain.

In extreme conditions it could hold water spilling from the Tees that might otherwise be heading for homes and businesses downriver.

The Wildlife Trust is happy for people to visit and enjoy the new Preston Farm reserve as soon as it is complete, or simply to use its path network as a pleasant route from Ingleby Barwick to Preston Hall.